


B is for Bear and Believing

by OrionLady



Series: The ABCs of Family [2]
Category: National Treasure (Movies)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Brotherly Love, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Epic Friendship, Families of Choice, Family Feels, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Gen, Past Character Death, Promises, Trust, Trust issues disguised as an existential crisis, Vulnerability, all the metaphors
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-13
Updated: 2020-03-19
Packaged: 2021-03-01 05:33:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23130112
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OrionLady/pseuds/OrionLady
Summary: Riley shows up out of nowhere on Sadusky’s doorstep at two in the morning, holding a giant stuffed polar bear and wearing a helicopter hat, topped off by sunglasses and a candy cigar hanging out of his mouth.“Do you believe in aliens?” he asks.Somehow it’s still a regular Tuesday.
Relationships: Benjamin Gates & Riley Poole
Series: The ABCs of Family [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1643848
Comments: 16
Kudos: 41





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I can't believe the response on this series! What an encouragement to find out that people still love these characters too. Thank you so much and I hope you enjoy this one just as much. (It also feels so appropriate to be posting this alien themed conversation on Friday the 13th.)
> 
> Bon apetit!

“How much has to be explored and discarded before reaching the naked flesh of feeling.”

~ Claude Debussy

When the kettle boils, singing its shrill song, Sadusky rustles from his armchair and wanders into the kitchen.

Most of the lights throughout the house are dim or off completely, creating a cozy, quiet atmosphere. After hours spent under fluorescent lights at the Bureau, he likes the dark effect. It allows his eyes—and his mind—to rest.

Not that it’s exactly working tonight. 

“One of the side effects of getting older,” his doctor had explained, that time Sadusky came in asking why he couldn’t sleep through the night anymore. “Your body sleeps in bursts now, rather than in great stretches like children do.”

Sadusky’s face pulls into a wad of disgust while he pours milk into his tea.

Older. Pah!

It has been not-so-subtly suggested to Peter many times that perhaps he should think about retirement. He can’t fathom it, his mind too fast and too excited about life to go out everyday and just play golf.

He shudders at the thought of such an unstimulated life.

They’ve also suggested that maybe he should go out and meet someone, start dating again. The theory that loneliness is compromising his health is ridiculous and somehow right on the nose, all at once. But even that feels blasphemous, to replace Katherine after such a beautiful life with her.

If he’s honest, he thought the job would kill him years ago, shot while out on a case. Since none of the proposed options appeal to him, he goes out every day as usual. The stakes just don’t seem so high anymore. So long as his girls are taken care of, what does his own health matter?

Sadusky is about to lower himself into the chair, mug of tea in hand to help him finally (hopefully) go to sleep, when there’s a funny knock at the door.

Peter cants his head, struck dumb by the fact that it’s…he checks the clock… _two in the bloody morning_ and the knock is rhythmic, like someone is tapping out the William Tell Overture.

He briefly considers changing out of his flannel sleep pants into something more formal for this highly suspect visitor, but decides against it. Whoever has the nerve to show up at his doorstep on a weeknight this late, or early, can deal with Sadusky in red flannel pants and a wool pullover. It has a blue dog on it, gifted to him by his granddaughter.

Sadusky doesn’t have a peephole or window in his front door, and now he’s wishing desperately that he did. Could it be an intruder? A ruse to get him out of the house?

Peter shakes off his investigator brain and again decides that if someone wants him that badly, they deserve the mug hot oolong he’ll fling down their shirt.

When he opens the door, it is not his next door neighbour in need of something. Nor is it a sketchy thief looking for an easy payday. Not the ghost of a past case or someone he put behind bars recently released from prison to come shank him.

Sadusky opens the door to see Riley slouched there, his arms full of a mammoth stuffed polar bear.

He’s wearing sunglasses, extraneous on this moonless night, and a helicopter hat with the little propeller spinning whenever he moves enough to create a breeze. A candy cigar hangs out of the left side of his mouth.

“Hey! Secret Agent Man!” He fires off a two fingered salute with the arm not wrangling said four foot polar bear. “Do you believe in aliens?”

Sadusky stands there and finds he’s still seriously debating throwing the hot tea in Riley’s face. Maybe he really is dozing in his armchair and will wake up to find this all a lucid dream.

“Mr. Poole, are you drunk?”

“I asked you first,” says Riley. “And no, I am _painfully_ awake and sober right now, thank you very much.”

Frozen, bewildered, Sadusky finally gets his brain working. He quirks a brow at Riley’s ridiculous appearance. “Dare I inquire about what all this is? Did a child’s birthday party throw up on you?”

“Funny.” Riley crunches the end off the cigar and it shrinks away into his mouth another inch. “Focus, Sadusky. Aliens. Thoughts?”

Peter sighs, resigning himself to the craziness that is his life now, ever since Ben Gates and this quick witted kid waltzed into it. He holds out his arm and steps aside so Riley can trundle out of the cold. At least he has the decency to toe off his shoes first.

“Thanks.” Riley collapses on the couch, on his back. Feet propped on the armrest. He’s still snuggling the bear close in a choke hold. “It’s been a night.”

Sadusky shakes his head while closing the door. “I can see that.”

The sunglasses fall back into Riley’s hair, on top of the hat, but he doesn’t stop them. Up close, the hacker’s eyes are listless and red rimmed, like he’s been crying. Peter’s face falls and he feels the first stirrings of worry—maybe this is more serious than he thought.

Sadusky stands over him for a beat. “Are you okay, Mr. Poole?”

“Why do you always do that?”

“Do what?”

“Call everyone Mr. or Mrs. even if you know them really well? Even Patrick is _Mr. Gates_ or Abigail is _Dr. Chase_.”

Sadusky retreats to his armchair. It’s close enough to the couch that he could reach over and grasp Riley’s ankle. He doesn’t, content to study the odd expression on Riley’s face until he can piece together this singular event.

“It’s habit, I’m afraid. Years at this job have forced me to be default courteous.”

“Well, it’s not necessary. Call me Riley.”

“Only if you call me Peter.”

Riley’s brows go up in exaggerated horror. “That’s weird. You arrested us, like, twice. I can’t call you _Peter_.”

It startles a laugh out of Sadusky. He gazes at a photo on the side table and wonders what Katherine would think of all this, these unique faces that have pulled him to places he never imagined. It’s a photo of them at a family barbeque, arms around each other mid-laughter. There’s mustard in his mustache and her hair is flecked with spray from a child’s water gun. A more carefree time.

“Would you like anything to drink, Mr…Riley?” Points for basic hospitality.

Riley waves the offer away in a jilted motion, left shoulder still stiff even after months of physiotherapy. Then he blinks very fast up at the ceiling. “Don’t you think it’s absurd?”

“What’s absurd?”

“That there’s so much we don’t know, so many unanswered questions in the universe.”

If this is sober Riley, waxing philosophical, Sadusky can’t fathom what he’s like drunk. Maybe _he’s_ the inebriated one, compromised by exhaustion.

“A lot of conspiracies theories too.” A smile creeps over Peter’s face. “Like aliens.”

Riley stills. “Did you read my book?”

“I especially loved the chapter on whaling ships and how they tied in to the aiding of piracy.”

The propeller spins suddenly when Riley lifts his head to stare at Sadusky. He even takes the cigar out of his mouth. “No way. That’s epic—a spy read my book.”

Sadusky doesn’t bother pointing out that he’s not technically a spy. The sheer pleasure and satisfaction in Riley’s eyes is not something to trampled, especially with the faint tremble Peter can now see in his fingers.

Something about the waxy, insipid face settles a rock in Sadusky’s gut and he angles forward. “Aliens appeal to the human spirit, don’t they? I can’t say I believe in them, but I understand why people want to.”

Riley flails a hand at him. “Thank you! They’re central, like nerf rifles.”

“Nerf rifles?” Now Sadusky’s totally lost.

“Yeah. They give us the power to process something scary using something friendly.” He pops his lips in that obnoxious way of children on long road trips everywhere. It’s a bit remarkable, given the fact he’s doing it around a candy stick in his mouth. “You can’t see stuff up there, right? But you believe that something might be there.”

Sadusky is silent for a beat, intensely working through the connotations of that statement. He sips at his tea. This whole interaction is one long string of non-sequiturs, and making sense of such a conversation requires more brain power than he has this early in the morning.

“Belief is a powerful force,” says Sadusky at last.

“So are promised things.” Riley blinks some more. “Even if you have no proof they’re there.”

Peter almost bails and asks about aliens and nerf guns, how they all tie together, until he bypasses this entirely for the real question: “And what do you believe is there?”

Riley shrugs, nonchalant. “It’s what’s promised that matters. Promises are like ideas. You can’t take them back and no matter how much you try to cover them up, they grow.”

His blasé attitude almost sneaks past Peter before he understands that the unsteady hands and bright eyes are just the tip of a very massive iceberg. His cigar is chewed almost down to the nub.

“Mmm.” Sadusky savours another gulp of the orange rind oolong. It settles his stomach and quiets his mind. “So why ask me about aliens?”

Riley doesn’t answer this right away, lapsing into an out of character quiet. Not silent exactly, as he’s still fidgeting and clenching his hands in the bear’s fur, but quiet. Like he’s run out of words and has to recalibrate. He swallows the last of the sugar.

“Do you have kids?” The tech asks, blindsiding Sadusky.

There are a whole myriad of ways he could answer that, roundabout the question, but if Riley is baring his soul, however odd the method, Peter knows he should too. He clears his throat, the old recliner creaking when he shifts. “Yes, a daughter. She’s a librarian at Washington State and married with a little girl, seven years old.”

“That’s neat. Except…ugh.” A faux disgusted sound falls from Riley’s lips. “I’m surrounded by academics and nerdy people. I can’t get away from you all.”

“You don’t think you count in that camp?” Sadusky dares to wheedle.

“Please, He Who Shall Not Be Called Peter. I’m _tech_ nerdy, not dusty tomes in the study hall nerdy.”

“Ah.” Sadusky smiles into his tea. “I see. And you avoided my question.”

Riley continues to do so, by asking another one. “Is Mrs. Sadusky supportive of all the reading and librarian life choices?”

It’s Peter’s turn to go quiet, wavering. He stares off into a middle distance filled with images from a lifetime long gone. Happy, golden images. “My wife died of a brain tumour over ten years ago, Riley.”

“Oh.” Riley blanches. He seems to wake from whatever fugue state carried his feet to Sadusky’s door, of all places. “I’m so, so sorry that I even asked. I’ll be going now.”

He shifts to lever himself up from the couch and Sadusky intercepts, hand on the top of his socked foot. “No, no, that’s okay. I don’t mind talking about her and you haven’t overstepped.”

Riley stares at him. There’s a white tuft of fur on his shirt. “I’m in your house at the witching hour of the night.”

“Maybe you overstepped a little,” Sadusky admits, trying to catch his winded breath. “But I'm not mad. I’m just…curious, why my house? Why come here?”

Riley flops back down and quirks a flippant brow. “It was on the way home. Sometimes a man just has to clear his head sometimes, you know?”

“On the way home from…?”

Riley sighs. “Does it matter?”

Sadusky’s concern grows, though it’s coupled with that exasperated fondness he remembers from when his daughter was a child. The guilelessness of a young mind and how they dance and trip their way through the world.

Something else occurs to Peter. “How did you know my address?”

Riley smiles for the first time, a broad and cheeky one that reminds Sadusky yet again of his daughter. “I wrote a book on government conspiracies, hacked into the National Archives, FBI servers, London traffic servers, and Buckingham Palace—to name just a few—and you’re asking how I found out something as simple as your address?”

_He’s right. Stupid question._

Out loud, firmly, Peter says, “Yes.”

“Oh, ah, well…” Riley shrinks, looking sheepish. “I asked your supervisor at work ages ago.”

A bubble pops in Sadusky’s throat, a quick laugh that he does absolutely nothing to quell. It sits in his stomach like the tea—warm, comforting, sleepy, and at ease. His quiet, lonely house is still dim, but Riley has brightened its interior with just his presence.

Sadusky squeezes his foot. Whatever is rattling around in the man’s head, it too seems to have calmed just by being here.

“What if people can’t keep their promises, Peter?”

Sadusky’s whole chest flutters. It’s such an unexpectedly vindicating experience to hear the pithy youth say his name like that, heavy, like it means something.

A moment passes before he can even speak.

“Well…are aliens really up there?”

Riley glances at him, gaze narrowed. “We can’t know that. Not yet, anyway.”

“Exactly. Sometimes all you have to do is wait, to trust in the person who made that promise.”

“People lie a lot.” Something hard, jaded is laced now through Riley’s voice. The bitter tone of experience.

“Yes,” says Peter softly, “they do. But in my experience, their actions rarely do. In those split second decision making moments, people reveal their true priorities, their true motives. If the promise was given from someone who’s proven that loyalty, then chances are good they’ll keep it.”

“No guarantees.”

“No, son, no guarantees.”

Something in Riley’s face twitches, scrunched while he thinks this over. His arms tighten around the bear. It’s got a ribbon around its neck, embroidered with little snowflakes and roses, and something about the sight incites a terrible load of gravitas over the room, married simultaneously with that mellow fragrance of tired, comfortable people. A symbol of juvenile purity tucked close to Riley’s doubtful, uncertain expression. It makes Peter keep his hand on the sock covered foot, makes him want to erase all the serrated edges of that pain. 

Makes him want to hunt down whoever put it there. 

Sadusky’s cellphone chirps with an incoming call, both of them jerking at the sound.

“Sorry about that,” he murmurs. Standing, he leaves the room when he sees the caller ID. Once in the kitchen, he grins. “Ben, listen—”

Ben is already talking, mid rant apparently at himself and Riley and some vendor who can’t even cheat properly and “ _I turned around for thirty seconds!_ ” and—

“Ben, he’s fine.”

A sudden silence punctuates the other end of the line. It breaks when Ben releases a harsh puff of breath, a pant.

“ _He bolted a few hours ago and I haven’t heard a peep since, not even a text, so we panicked. I knew it was a long shot…_ ”

“Your instincts were right. He showed up at my door twenty minutes ago.”

“ _Was he still carrying that huge bear?_ ”

Sadusky laughs quietly. “One of a kind kid, isn’t he?”

“ _One who makes my life a nightmare at every possible opportunity._ ”

Ben’s tone has warmed, thawing in relief that Riley wasn’t hit by a car or passed out in a ditch somewhere. Sadusky is tempted to point out that Riley is grown man, one who fended for himself in a myriad of ways before he ever even met Ben, but it’s a moot point. After all this family has been through, they don’t leave safety to chance.

“ _Thanks, Peter. I’ll be there in a few minutes._ ”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Both of Peter’s brows shoot up. “Is the great Benjamin Franklin Gates admitting there’s a puzzle he doesn’t want to decode?”
> 
> “I never said I didn’t know the answer,” he fires back. “I just don’t think the world needs to know everything. Some things are too rare, too private.”
> 
> Sadusky catches Ben’s fond look at Riley and the giant bear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Stay safe out there, friends.

Sadusky has somehow forgotten, impossibly, that Ben Gates is a man who says exactly what he means and keeps to it—Peter only has _four minutes_ to go into the kitchen and reheat his tea before a quiet knock sounds on his door for the second time that night. It’s either a feat of risky driving or Ben has somehow developed the ability to teleport.

“Come on in!” Peter calls.

By the time he adds some honey to the steaming mug and trundles back out into his living room, it is to see Ben stooped over Riley on the couch. Riley’s posture is steel now, the whites of his eyes visible at the corner where he’s looking up at Ben and, by the body language, not comfortable with this fact.

“What were you thinking?” Ben is berating. “Huh? What if you’d been jumped!”

Riley’s jaw ticks. “I needed to process.”

“Process…by putting as much distance between you and us as possible. Sure.”

“That’s …” Riley tilts the bear slightly so it’s between them. “That’s not what I meant, Ben.”

“At least give me some warning! Were you out wandering this whole time? Did you _walk_ all the way from the fair?”

“Maybe.”

The conversation is tense, not their usual brand of snarky banter. It’s blocky and stiff and not at all in character. Whatever happened shook them both in ways they haven’t worked through.

Ben swears some more under his breath for good measure, then yanks a patchy woolen throw off the back of Peter’s arm chair and drapes it over Riley. The young man’s digits are white but starting to gain more pink, Sadusky sees now.

For his part, Ben is ruddy cheeked and still in his coat, showing that he quite literally raced to be here and his breathing is too fast to be considered composed or just from the exertion. Something in his eyes is the heaviest thing of all, an agonized weight of desperation he doesn’t let show too often.

Hearing the shuffle of Sadusky’s slippers, Ben turns. He backs away from the couch, running a hand down his face and looking worse than Sadusky feels. Riley eyes Ben for a moment longer, with an expression Sadusky has only seen on him a few times, assessing and wounded. Ben doesn’t notice, though his own eyes fixate on the way Riley’s shoulder is starting to lock up from the cold and stress.

Sadusky wants to ask, “is _anybody_ doing okay?”

But instead, knowing the answer to this anyway, he says, “This is turning into a party.”

“Sorry.” Ben’s apology is sincere, especially when he glances at the mantel clock.

“Don’t be.” Sadusky gestures to the whole scene. “I haven’t had this much excitement since the last time you committed a felony.”

Ben doesn’t _quite_ smile back, but some of the wound up coils inside him start to loosen.

“Is there hot chocolate in this joint?” Riley asks out of the blue. He shifts to standing and only sways a little. Ben shoots out a hand to keep him upright. It’s on his bicep, and Ben doesn’t let go until Riley can stay still for longer than a second. “That would go a long way towards me not feeling like a popsicle.”

Sadusky smiles. “In the kitchen. Help yourself, Mr. Poole.”

“Aht!”

“Sorry, _Riley_.”

Riley, now wearing the blanket like a cape, all the way up over his now hat-free head and _still_ holding the bear, waddles past them for the kitchen doorway. A tassel of unruly brown hair puffs out over the blanket lip and Sadusky has the weird urge to reach out and give it a twist. Which he most definitely does not do.

He merely reciprocates when Riley offers his fist, bumping it lightly.

“Thanks, Secret Agent Man.”

Ben shakes his head, at his wit’s end but struck into a wordless kind of frustration. Coming down off the spiral of worry, he closes his eyes. Once they’re alone, Sadusky presses his shoulder. Even through the coat, his pulse beats fast.

“He’s fine, Ben.”

“I know, I just…”

Sadusky tucks his free hand in his pocket. “What happened? You guys were at that harvest fair outside the city?”

Ben nods, absent, eyes now on Riley’s mismatched shoes. Though they’ve been scrubbed to high heaven, dried blood still clings to the toes from their home invasion back in May. One green Converse and one black. Shoelaces religiously replaced whenever they break. Right now, they’re golden llama laces, wearing little shamrock hats.

Peter shakes his head, wondering where on earth Riley found such a thing and then deciding he doesn’t want to know.

“He refuses to touch a gun and never has in all the time I’ve known him. He hates violence, even in video games.” Ben waves a hand, helpless, at where Riley was sitting moments earlier. “And yet he’s a savant with carnival nerf guns. Go figure.”

All at once, Sadusky laughs, putting at least some of this bizarre night together. “He won all this stuff, the hat and the bear.”

“Among other things, yeah.”

“Do I want to know how much he conned game stalls out of?”

It’s Ben’s turn to grin and he looks more like himself when he does it. That restless and loyal man Sadusky has come to respect. “No, you definitely don’t. And he didn’t con them—he’s just that good. Abigail will have a forest of stuffed animals to come home to.”

Peter laughs again and takes a moment to appreciate it all, standing there in his pajamas, a ruffled, millionaire treasure hunter and his hacker best friend filling up the house, smelling of cotton candy and crisp fall air, leaving white bear fur everywhere and doodled sneakers on the entry mat. Hot cocoa mixes with the menagerie of scents, along with the sound of a carton popping open.

“That was a favourite habit of Katherine’s,” he says suddenly. “Putting a dash of chocolate milk in hot cocoa.”

Now where did that come from? Sadusky is surprised at himself for blurting that fact, the hushed admission of happier times. He rarely talks about Katherine if he can help it.

But Ben just lights up, pleased to hear even this banal tidbit of his life. “Really? We’re always telling Riley it’s too rich, but he’ll be pleased to know he’s not the only one.”

Peter suspects that Ben has dug up at least a little bit of personal information about him, though he doesn’t offer any condolences or sympathetic sentiments upon hearing Katherine mentioned.

Instead, Ben looks him dead in the eye with a terribly solemn expression—“Did you feel ready to have kids, Peter?”

Funny, that he’s cycling through the same conversation twice in one night, however differently they may be packaged.

“Of course not. Nobody ever does, Ben.” Sadusky takes a photo frame off the mantel, one of himself many years younger, holding his baby daughter. Ben accepts it, delighted. He traces the outline of her chubby face. “I had no idea what I was doing. But if you love them, put your kids first, you work through the mistakes and problems together.”

“Mmm…” Ben glances from the couch to the photo and back. His eyes are narrowed with that mile-a-minute spark Sadusky recognizes from years of puzzle solving. This time, he can’t seem to decipher the answer he wants.

“Promises are a powerful thing,” Sadusky offers.

Ben starts. “What…how do you…?”

“It’s something Riley said when he got here.”

Like Sadusky has just jabbed a pin in Ben’s side, he deflates. “We’re expecting. Four months along now.”

Peter’s cheeks are stating to hurt, from all this smiling and feeling alive business. “Congratulations, Ben. You and Abigail will make great parents.”

Nodding, Ben accepts the clap on his back and hands the photo back so Peter can reverently slide it into its rightful spot. “After what happened in May…we realized life was short and we had to make the most of it.”

“And you have.” Sadusky cants his head when Ben’s Adam’s apple slides, the latent fretting in his face. “How does Riley fit into all this?”

A swollen pause follows this and something slithers through Ben’s gaze, in white hot firework flashes, that even Sadusky can’t read. A fuse trail of gunpowder winding its way through the room, about to reach its target and blow.

“That’s just it, we, uh…” Ben’s eyes flick to the kitchen at the sound of Riley’s spoon clattering while he stirs. “Tonight, we broke the news and asked him to be godfather.”

 _Aaahhh._ This makes complete sense to Peter, why Riley would be bestowed such an honour and then just…sneak away.

“He made me ready.” The words are blatant and bold, not ashamed or timid to be confessed. Ben’s eyes glow with protective, wild fire. “Watching him get hurt, it snapped something inside of me and I knew I had to take that next step with Abigail, that I even could.”

“You should tell him that,” says Sadusky, and the truth of it settles around them like snow. Cold, beautiful, weighted.

“I just don’t get it.” Ben braces one hand on his hip. “We thought he’d be thrilled.”

“He is, Ben. But he’s also scared.”

“Scared?” Ben’s head snaps around. “Why in the world—”

“Because he’s been let down so often before. Ben, come on. You offering him the position as godfather was proof he’s still a part of this family, a promise that he isn’t being asked to leave just because…”

Sadusky trails off to sip at his tea and throw Ben a meaningful look.

Ben visibly doesn’t comprehend, not fully, but he watches Riley meander back in, licking chocolate off his lips and wrangling the bear one handed, and something in his face clears.

Sadusky taps at Riley’s back when he passes by. “Is that bear for the new baby?”

Riley doesn’t miss a beat. “Don’t be ridiculous, Peter—this bear is for you.”

“Me?” Sadusky huffs, caught off guard yet again. “What the Dickens am I going to do with a giant polar bear?”

“You’ll figure it out soon enough,” says Riley, horribly cryptic. He’s claimed Peter’s armchair this time, knees thrown over one of the arms and using the remote to browse through channels on an old black and white TV in the corner. It only gets four, and Riley settles on a rerun of _Citizen Kane._

Sadusky lowers his voice so it won’t be heard over the sound of the movie and an Orson Welles monologue. “Are you finally going to tell me how you two met?”

It’s becoming a joke, how much he asks and how they never deign to tell him. Just one of their many secrets.

Crinkles appear around Ben’s eyes, muted white light from the TV turning them an almost golden colour. They look the way Peter feels, bronzed and worn and hopeful. Sure enough, Ben answers the same way they always do—

“Not a chance.”

“Are you at least going to tell me about the MIT hoodie?” Sadusky nudges his ribs. “Ben, he was expelled from MIT during his graduate degree for hacking a local police department database. I still have yet to figure out the secret of why he did it in the first place and better yet why he was never _arrested_ for that.”

Ben’s smile only grows. “Some mysteries aren’t meant to be solved.”

Both of Peter’s brows shoot up. “Is the great Benjamin Franklin Gates admitting there’s a puzzle he doesn’t want to decode?”

“I never said I didn’t know the answer,” he fires back. “I just don’t think the world needs to know everything. Some things are too rare, too private.”

Sadusky catches Ben’s fond look at Riley and the giant bear.

“Yes,” says Peter in a gentler tone. “They are. Have you decided on a name yet?”

“We have, but that’s a secret too, unfortunately.”

“One that I happen to know,” Riley sing-songs, still slurping his hot cocoa.

He says it with smug pride, a brave move since his nose is dotted with melted marshmallow. Peter didn’t even know he _had_ marshmallows in the house.

Ben makes a warning sound. “No, you don’t, you liar. And even if you did, that secret is one you will keep to yourself if you want to live to reach thirty.”

“Yippee.” Riley raises his mug. “Cheers to getting old.”

This stops Ben in his tracks. “Was that an aging joke?”

“If the shoe fits, gramps.”

“I’m going to be a first time father, not a grandfather.”

“A grumpy old man would say that.”

Ben points his thumb at Sadusky. “What does that make him? No offense, Peter.”

Peter hides his smirk with another sip. “None taken.”

Riley mutes the movie and cranes his neck to peer at Ben with a surprisingly serious expression. “He’s _wizened_ , Ben. There’s a difference. He has that sentient-tree-from- _Pocahontas_ vibe. No offense, Peter.”

Sadusky wags his head back and forth, lips pursed in hyperbolic thought. “I think that’s a compliment, actually. Or at least I’m choosing to take it that way.”

Riley takes one hand off the bear to snap it into a finger gun. “Exactly! See, Ben, Peter gets it.”

There’s a shrewd look on Ben’s face that melts into something warm when he looks at Sadusky. “I’ll have to take some pointers, then.”

Sadusky almost chokes on his tea.

“Anytime,” he manages to say without sounding like he’s just run a marathon, without giving away his pounding heart. “I’ve dealt with every parenting blunder under the sun and I’m more than happy to be a helpful tree.”

Riley raises his arms in satisfaction, spilling hot chocolate onto the blanket. “You’re the best secret agent ever.”

“And you’re making a mess.” Ben’s tone is blunt but his expression indulgent. “I hope you’re going to clean all this before we go.”

Nope. Ben Gates does not need one single parenting tip, Sadusky decides in that moment. He’s had plenty of practice so far.

“Oh, don’t worry.” Riley points to the kitchen. “I did all of the dirty dishes a minute ago. And…I’m sorry for scaring you, Ben.”

Ben lets out a breath, a slow one, like he’s finally powered down and has to expel any lingering fear. “I’m sorry we broke both pieces of news to you all at once without any prep. That we didn’t preface the offer with a disclaimer that you’ll always be a part of this family, Riley.”

Riley goes quiet. His lips thin, white with pressure.

Ben comes over to take one of those cold hands, bending to see Riley better and put them at eye level. “You’re not my co-worker anymore or even just a friend. You’re like a brother.”

“A very irritating little brother, or so Abigail tells me.” Riley’s tone is cautious but hopeful, a perfect match for Ben’s expression.

“Got that right. I want you to understand that this baby…that nothing— _no one_ —could replace you.”

“Well, duh. I knew _that_.” Riley’s skittering eyes betray him, as does his sudden flush. “You guys wouldn’t survive five minutes without me.”

There’s a sudden, odd droop to Ben’s shoulders, like he might fall over from something bowling into him at great speed. His features smooth with a mixture of love and amusement. He nods with a sombre gaze. “That we wouldn’t. I can only hope you don’t teach my daughter too many illegal things.”

“Daughter? _Daughter_?” Riley sits upright and swivels, both feet on the floor, so fast it makes Sadusky dizzy just looking at him. “You’re having a _girl_?!”

“Yeah.” Ben laughs. He pats Riley once on the cheek. “You scrammed before I could tell you that part.”

“Dude. She really will be Pocahontas.”

“Does that make you the raccoon?”

“Don’t push it.”

Ben perches on the arm of the chair to ruffle at Riley’s hair. “So? Does this mean you accept the job offer?”

“Last time you made me a job offer, I almost got blown up in the Arctic Circle.” Riley leans his shoulder into Ben’s hip. “But your kid needs someone to save her from the boredom of academia and dust that lurks in your home.”

“Yeah?” Ben’s smile is ecstatic now.

Riley mirrors it. “Yeah, Ben. I’d love to. I also don’t trust anybody else to be godfather.”

“I completely agree. That’s why we asked you specifically.”

Beaming, like someone just handed him a Nobel Prize, Riley sits a little straighter.

Ben exchanges a glance with Sadusky and then wraps his left arm around Riley’s shoulders. This is so he can check on the bullet scar and its swelling, where Riley’s pectoral meets his deltoid muscles. It’s a gesture he does often now, subtly gauging the wound’s progress since the tendons weren’t healing right at first and Riley could barely hold a cup, let alone move the shoulder. Even now, Sadusky will catch him having trouble pulling open a door on cold mornings.

“Hey.” Riley’s eyes flare, animating with an idea. “Do you think I could use her when she’s in her carrier for ops? Nobody ever checks a diaper bag or baby pockets for microchips.”

Ben freezes. “Uh, over my dead body—”

Sadusky finishes that thought before he can. “Are you really going to propose that in front of an active federal agent?”

“Oh please.” Riley snorts, not phased in the least. Peter wonders when he lost his intimidating agent aura that used to scare criminals so much. “You’re too cool to bust me for something like that.”

Ben continues the chewing out, already making a list of things he is _not_ allowed to do when Riley’s niece comes. There’s the word ‘sister’ blurted out in there too, a telling slip up on both their parts, that Peter isn’t sure they’re even aware of. Perhaps that’s for the best.

Sadusky doesn’t join in, leaning back against the wall to just watch this play out, the noise and life swelling in every nook of his house. The dismal emptiness of earlier is banished by Riley’s clashing clothes, his chirped protests, and how Ben can’t seem to resist touching him, pulling him close with a hand hooked around his chest, Riley’s elbow on his friend’s knee, even while arguing over whether it’s dishonest to use a baby to pick up girls at the park.

Peter’s eyes stray again to Katherine’s photo—he realizes he’s smiling just as wide now as he was in that picture.

Maybe his doctors are on to something.

* * *

It isn’t until Friday that Peter walks into his office and sees at least ten agents huddled around his desk, giggling. He stops, briefcase hanging from one lax hand, and squints. They’re not pale or concerned, so no threat or higher ups here to fire him. In fact, the agents under his command are all whispering and pointing at something.

A package, perhaps? Some embarrassing photos or a weird sandwich prank to make fun of his eating habits?

He gathers himself and drops his case to the floor. “Someone want to tell me when my desk became the office water cooler?”

All ten or so agents whirl around in a completely unison motion to stare at Peter like squirrels caught by a flash camera. It’s endearing and disconcerting all in one.

Peter’s lips twitch. “A room full of experts who’ve faced bombs, bullets, and terrorists and no one can give me an answer?”

Since they’re all in a circle, Peter has to part them to get to his desk. It takes some shoulder angling and shuffling.

One of the agents shakes herself. “We think you have a secret admirer, boss.”

Thoroughly intrigued now, Peter finally makes it within eye sight of his chair—

Only to see one very giant, very white polar bear sitting upright in it, wearing a helicopter hat and sunglasses.

A warm meteor of tenderness crashes into Peter’s gut and winds him for a moment. He knows he’s probably grinning like a sook and doesn’t much care. If all the fireworks in the state went off at once in his belly, he thinks it would feel something like this, would explain the faint tremble of protectiveness and affection in each limb.

“Not quite.” His voice is soft, like his gaze. 

There’s also a tag around the bear’s neck that reads: ‘for the best honorary grandfather and sentient tree ever. Give it to some other kid with no parents, one less fortunate than this girl is going to be. They need it more than I do.’

“Boss?” one young agent tilts his head in confusion. “Not a love interest, then?”

Sadusky clears his throat to cover up a sudden sheen over his eyes, already mentally planning a trip to the hospital or nearest group home after work.

“Actually…yes.” Sadusky’s heart pops with heat and life, the verve of newfound expectation. Of family, and all the forms it comes in. “Something like that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This whole thing is so cheesy but I love the simple concept, the poignancy, of the Gates family steadily adopting Peter. It makes me feel full, like a big meal. :)


End file.
